


heart and soul

by 24ko



Series: mcgenji au week 2018 [5]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Blackwatch Era, Blackwatch Genji Shimada, Blackwatch Jesse McCree, Kitsune, M/M, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-15
Updated: 2018-07-15
Packaged: 2019-06-10 18:34:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15297537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/24ko/pseuds/24ko
Summary: "You want a mission? Then your mission is to recuperate from whatever the hell this is." Gabriel stops abruptly, like he's got a good idea he wants to add on. They both brace themselves. "Jesse, you're on babysitting duty."





	heart and soul

**Author's Note:**

> for mcgenji au week - no other solution. i struggled through some parts and i'm still not sure if this answers the prompt, but i was surprised i had some fun with this - enough fun that it put me behind schedule lol. as always, raw without beta. sentences that are primarily italics should be understood as the characters conversing in another language. thank you for reading!

Suspicious activity in Tokyo took them to the Ginza district. The mission was straightforward: blend in, gather information, and leave. Jesse spent the evening watching Genji move with singular focus. It was worlds different from what he or anyone was used to seeing when not on a mission - sheer misery and unbridled rage radiate from so many of Genji's mannerisms, his general disposition. But there, he was unexpectedly stylish, effortlessly cool; armed with the photostatic veil, he wore a rogue grin that drew many club patrons to him. He didn't even need the Gucci socks. Over his drink, Jesse thought, that was how it used to be for him.

Outside, the summer night is warm and almost suffocating. Jesse takes a long drag from his cigarette.

"That's not what you're used to smoking, is it?" His head jerks up - he hadn't heard anyone approaching, and sure as hell, no one was there before. A woman stands at the wall opposite him. Her skin is sun-kissed with subtle shimmer; her hair like spun gold, in tight ringlets - he can tell it'd be a lot longer if she wore them loose. She wears an easy smile, not unlike Genji's, and she is fox-faced. "Did I startle you? Cowboy."

Jesse chuckles, his voice soft and husky from trying to talk to Genji over the low, repetitive pulse and high-energy thrum of music. Like a mantra. Like a chant. He looks left and right, and she makes to take the cigarette from him, moving like this is all pre-choreographed, like a dance.

Genji's hand is fast, like lightning, like the crack of a whip. He grips her wrist hard, bends it back towards her. With his other hand, he plucks the cigarette from Jesse and tosses it to the ground and crushes it under the heel of his expensive boot. Despite his violence, it still smolders.

They stand in silence. With each blink of Jesse's eyes, the woman becomes increasingly mirthful. It gets to a point where she's about to burst into hysterics.

" _You think it's me?_ " She finally says, incredulous. " _You came here for me? To apprehend me?_ " The laughter that bubbles up and out of her is light and playful. Genji is careful in not responding to her, but drops her wrist like it burns. Jesse catches a glimpse of Genji's palm - he's no expert on all the scars and burns on Genji's body, no, but he thinks the subtle shine and pinch of skin is new.

" _Leave_ ," Genji warns. The photostatic veil starts to falter. It isn't the only thing that does: the carefully regulated light of Genji's chest flickers brighter than it has all night. The woman gets in his space, taps on his chest with a long nail that glimmers under all the light of a Ginza back alley. Jesse isn't sure if it's artificial or not. " _I won't ask again._ " His voice sounds tinny again, the modulator that helps him speak as loyal as ever, a reminder of the integrity of the body he never asked for. Around them, the air thickens and crackles with a mischief that starts to push his buttons. Their bodies have been buzzing with pent-up energy all night, and threaten to burst.

She reaches up and pats his cheek, like one would a baby-faced child with a plump face. Genji doesn't do much beyond stiffen. Jesse is secretly glad he doesn't further escalate, but he's having trouble figuring out how to properly defuse with his limited Japanese and bad accent. There's not exactly much about that that's charming. But - she spoke to him earlier, didn't she?

" _I see respect is too difficult a concept for you to grasp_ ," the woman observes and takes a step back. Her heels click as she circles around Genji, who grits his teeth. She studies him, no longer continuing her coquettish facade. He's able to pick up some of what she says.

"What my friend here don't have, I make up for," Jesse bows his head slightly, makes a grand gesture with his hands, like he's trying to bring back the light-hearted feeling they had going. Genji narrows his eyes at him. They glow red as the veil flickers. _Strangle me later, pardner._

Laughter, like bells. "And what can you offer me?" She's got entirely too much eyelash going on. If she's going for the ethereal look, taking inspiration from biblical nightmare fuel, Jesse thinks she's making it work. It is a little hard to look away once she meets his gaze. "I don't have practical use for riches, and to me, your most interesting characteristic is that you are a handsome foreigner."

Genji lunges at her once Jesse realizes he's rooted to where he stands, cold air washing over him, anticipatory like the seconds before thunder rumbles in a storm. She whips around, faster than him, stops him without difficulty. " _Vanished into the clouds,_ " she murmurs. " _Shining Genji._ "

The static in his comm is as deafening as the roar of an ocean. The woman peels the veil off Genji's face and it glimmers like holographic tulle as she crumples it in her hand. Genji struggles with newfound alarm. " _I will do this out of kindness._ "

" _I don't need_ \-- _don't touch me!_ " Genji spits and tries to lean away from her. She doesn't respond - she doesn't let go.

"You out here scolding him, but y'don't practice what you preach?" Jesse rushes forward, puts his hands on her shoulders to draw her away. Her skin is hot and feverish and he lets go almost immediately with a hiss. What in the hell? He draws Peacekeeper now, cocks the hammer, but he still isn't certain about what she is. An omnic wearing someone's skin?

She kisses Genji.

It's a kiss Jesse can't see, but Genji feels his breath leave him, and then his strength. It figures that even this body, made to be loyal, betrays him in the end.

They have to get the hell out of there. Genji crumples to the ground, his legs giving out on him, and he's not conscious. The woman leaves - she returns into the darkness, the grind of human bodies and rapid, heated throb of percussion of the club. She doesn't show Jesse her back. When he glances up at her, her eyes which were like rich honey glow an eerie pale gold. Her skin is illuminated by the otherworldly blue light that strobes like licks of fire.

After determining that Genji's vitals are fine - _for him_ , at least - Jesse retrieves the veil from where it lays sadly on the ground and concludes its functionality is still intact. He puts it on Genji's face, and he almost hates himself for thinking he looks better with the wrinkles between his eyebrows, squinting at him distrustfully, but he saves that for later. The veil is still calibrated for Genji's use. The veil glimmers and the illusion of living flesh disguises the matte, synthetic flesh of his jaw.

When the static clears, Jesse pulls Genji's arm over his shoulders and pretends he's heavy and blackout drunk. He requests extraction and prepares himself for correspondence with Gabriel.

\- - - - - - - - - - 

Blackpoint: Shanghai is _small_ , like a deep, unsightly pimple under the already cramped Watchpoint: Shanghai. It don't make sense why they're so close, but there's nothing he can do about it, so whatever. Jesse's forehead is red from where he forgets to duck his head going from room to room. His ears ring from the sheer earful Gabriel unleashed on him. He is both surprised and unsurprised that Angela is here as quick as she is; they both stay with Genji for the remainder of the night, trying to glean some kind of scientific understanding of what the hell happened.

Come morning, they go over what they know one more time. It honestly just seems like a reverse Sleeping Beauty-type thing where the kiss puts the princess to sleep instead of waking her up. Jesse casts a glance back at Genji, or his feet, where they stick out on the bed just behind the curtain. Where they _were_ , because they're not anymore. "What the hell," he mutters, and places his hand on Angela's shoulder.

"I don't know where he'd think to go _here_ ," Jesse huffs, exasperated. He's kind of had enough.

Angela pulls back the curtains and gasps.

\- - - - - - - - - - 

They prep and head to Zurich together later that morning with the cutest carry-on, if he has to say so himself. Jesse ventures a peek at Genji every now and again and receives a murderous glare in return. But it's really hard to be threatened by a face as pudgy as that.

"Stop. Staring," Genji grits out, his little fists balled up where they rest on his knees.

He can't say no to a face like that. Jesse looks away, like he always does when Genji tells him, and busies himself with other matters.

Gabriel waits for them when they land. Specifically, he waits for an explanation. So Jesse relays it to him like he saw it, and then they look at Genji. Genji refuses to speak. It's different - before, he'd have just thought, he just doesn't wanna talk about it, so let him be. But as a child, that expression and body language just makes him seem petulant and ill-mannered. He didn't want to talk about it to Jesse earlier, so he's not surprised about it now. But he didn't want to talk about it to Angela either.

"You seem to be forgetting the part where even if I didn't care," and here, Gabriel squats to be eye-level with Genji. Oh, no, he hates that. His baby jaw clenches hard and Jesse wants to warn him that the tooth fairy won't give the whole quarter for tooth shards. "We would still lose your skillset as an agent, because child operatives are not our thing."

It doesn't get him to open up about it.

"So if you don't _tell_  us what you know, so we can _get_  people on it," Gabriel's voice drops low, threatening. "You're gonna be in daycare for a very long time, mister, and the sharpest thing you'll get to hold there is gonna be safety scissors."

It's a staring contest. Jesse shakes his head - he's seen Gabriel lose enough of these to Fareeha. Gabriel might have a lot of practice, but Genji is crankier and much more bitter than she is.

Genji folds, but not before Gabriel's eyes dry out and he's forced to blink.

She was a creature he thought wasn't real, was just folklore. She had to be free, her soul not bound and weakened by a shrine, and she was looking to feed on whatever hedonistic bastard crossed her path. When Genji finally found Jesse, he stopped him from interacting with her and inviting her into his space, his mind. Whatever feelings Genji was having, she zeroed in on them and cast an illusion on him against his will. He feels the same - unfortunately. He and Angela discovered earlier that he still needed to be dosed the same, and as McCree had found, his vitals and results were consistent with other readings and results. The illusion she had cast distorted physical, not physiological reality where it concerned him.

"The kiss!" Jesse exclaims. "That explains that. I thought you were just choosin' to be in character." That is, for the most part, one of the only things that clicks for him.

Genji sends him the most hateful look a child has ever sent his way.

"Okay, anything you remember from the folklore that fixes this? Preferably, with you alive and in one piece? Oh - sorry." From how nonchalant he sounds, it's clear that Gabriel is a little sore about losing the staring contest - and a little skeptical. But Genji is from the crime family that bonds fucking dragons to their souls and calls on them when something or someone needs to die, so he's taking Genji's word for it.

Genji sends that same hateful look to Gabriel. "It was a contract. I will continue to look like this until I do what she wants." It doesn't help much. She wasn't the kiss and tell type of individual.

"What was she sayin' to you? Before she sealed the contract?" Jesse's never experienced anything like that before, fortunately. His mother was as god-fearing and superstitious as they came, with a crucifix and holy water bottle blessed by a priest in every room of their home. The one in his room was blessed by an archbishop. He wishes she kept it instead.

"To be _nice_. She did this to me as a kind gesture." Jesse picks up on the logic - the man already thinks he's at his lowest point. Now people can't take him seriously and he can't distract himself from that with hours and hours of training, like usual. Just how kind could this be? Genji has to look up at him - he has to tilt his head up even more. But Jesse thinks if he got down on one knee to be eye level, next to Gabe, Genji would find a way to murder them in their sleep.

"Ain't like she followed us," he points out. "And she's got nothin' to gain, makin' you look like this. She don't feed off humiliation she can't see, right?" At Genji's silence, Jesse keeps going. "We was jus' talkin' when you came'n grabbed her - which, by the way, not very polite. She took a good, long look at you. Decided to do this. Maybe you're implying she was gonna make a meal outta me, but we both felt what we felt. She coulda done that any time, probably bend reality or whatever like she did to you'n make sure ain't no one find us. And she let us go unscathed."

"Fun," Genji mutters.

"You might not like it, but it sounds like he knows more than you do about how to fix it." Gabriel rises to his feet and starts walking away towards his next appointment.

"No--" Genji says, and it's not in protest, but Gabriel won't hear anything he's got to say now if it starts with "no."

"You want a mission? Then your mission is to recuperate from whatever the hell this is." He stops abruptly, like he's got a good idea he wants to add on. They both brace themselves, familiar with how Gabriel straightens his posture and sends them a glance over his shoulder. "Jesse, you're on babysitting duty."

Well, he expected as much. Jesse looks down at Genji, who continues to fume. "What were you gonna say? You said fun, right?"

"Children are carefree," Genji says, still staring after Gabriel. "I do not have that luxury. She's forcing me to live like a child out of _kindness_." Huh.

"She got you purposely benched 'cause she wants you to have fun." He's still turning the thought over in his head. "She wants you to have fun, Genji." Jesse smiles a little, because god-damn. Genji turns and looks up at him, and the angle he has to crane his neck to do this can't be pleasant. Jesse makes to bend over a little, and he holds his arms out in a silent offer.

Genji stomps on his foot and then stomps away to his quarters.

It takes not just his efforts, but Angela's, too. Genji takes a break from seething in his bare room to glower up at them. They get him to at least try to have fun. It really is the only idea they have, and it's worth a shot. Angela is reaching out to Japanese folklore and mythology scholars in hopes that someone's research, analysis, and interpretations could contribute something. And looking for fun - that's Jesse's idea. Both options lead to a potential solution. What could he possibly have to lose?

"My dignity," he answers, like he hasn't already convinced himself he has none left to begin with.

"Look," Jesse says while he rubs the back of his neck. He hadn't noticed that he'd been hunching over - making his already shitty posture worse. "Genji, you deal with some pretty heavy thoughts. We both know they're not gonna leave you any time soon. They might not leave you at all. I don't think she turned you into this to fix that."

"That's right," Genji says, and he jabs a finger into Jesse's gut. "You don't think. You didn't think. This is why I am like this." All three of them know the point didn't just go over Genji's head. Jesse blessedly doesn't interrupt him. With something that sounds like a sigh, he looks away, and then stares at Jesse's sternum, then Angela's. "Since you are both so insistent, I will go." Jesse supposes, now, accepting help isn't the worst thing that's happened to Genji this week.

Genji spins on his heels, which screech from the drag of cheap rubber soles on cement, and closes the door behind him. Jesse and Angela share a look. Then she retrieves her tablet and, as the resident connoisseur of fun things to do in Switzerland, lays out her recommendations.

\- - - - - - - - - - 

By her recommendations, they end up at an amusement park by a beach. The heat is not too wet, which is nice, and the water brings the heat down a few degrees as well. Jesse and Genji look mismatched, even though they're dressed casually, to blend in. But Jesse supposes they normally look mismatched too.

"Want your jacket?" Jesse offers Genji a comically bright windbreaker. He thinks back to Genji's disguise back when they met the woman - the creature, he corrects. The disguise that wasn't really a disguise, because that was his face, once. That Genji could've worn this windbreaker well, too, if it were sized appropriately for him.

"No," Genji says, with less force than Jesse expects. It's not exactly child-like wonder on his face, with all these rides and flashing lights and vendors shouting from their game booths and food booths. It's not exactly child-like wonder, but it might be similar.

The time passes in silence. The silence may be companionable.

For the most part, Jesse picks rides they try out. Genji would maintain his "cover" - that he had no choice but to go, that it was a better use of his time - but Jesse always looks over and catches Genji _reacting_ , which beats his usual indifference and disinterest by far. And neither have tried any games yet, but Jesse's definitely eyeing the shooting games. Ain't that much different from the norm - trading one kinda clown for another.

Gleeful shrieking draws their attention from the ferris wheel to the bumper cars, and he thinks he sees Genji's interest physically manifest in the way he straightens up to get a better look. On impulse, Jesse scoops him up and bounces him once, twice, like he's a toddler and not a grown ass adult. Because Genji won't let himself ask, Jesse takes the initiative and beelines for it. Genji is stiff, like a mortified cat. Jesse glows with satisfaction.

Unfortunately, Jesse barely fits into the car. It's just his luck, or maybe it's just desserts for having Genji glower at him from the "you must be this tall to ride" standees and snapping a few photos. He waits with some parents by the exit gate, then he watches Genji tear off in his tiny green car, the best child driver in there. He systematically rams into the cars of all the teens and adults - Jesse could maybe call this Genji's catharsis - and spares the children. His disappointment when the buzzer signals the end is palpable.

Like some of the parents waiting for their children, Jesse holds his hand out in wait, fully expecting Genji to roll his eyes or pass him. When he doesn't do either of those things and takes Jesse's hand instead, Jesse's surprise must show on his face. He squeezes Genji's hand and he knows that whatever happened to him, there are _parts_ of him that can't be replaced. The hand he's holding has always been cybernetic in the time he's known Genji. It's cold, like Genji has clammy palms, and it makes him squeeze that much tighter. Genji says nothing.

If the other night was a throwback to Genji as a teen or young adult, he wonders if this was what he was like as a child. If he was stubborn, good at bumper cars, had clammy hands; if his eyes got big at every flashy thing he passed by, if his nose always crinkled in anticipation when he heard the sizzle of meat. When Genji was first recruited, though that wasn't entirely his choice - Jesse wryly, and with a little anger on Genji's behalf, thinks _not much things_ are _entirely Genji's choice_ \- he wasn't careful, but at the same time, he was. He was carefully guarded, was not uncooperative and did what he was recruited for - but at the same time, he was not docile. It wasn't unlike Jesse's own experience, but the things he had to confront and overcome were and still are much more different than what Genji has to unpack. He just thinks that as different as they are, it's nice to have some kind of shared life experience.

He stops walking when Genji stops walking and points to another line, this time for food. It smells sweet, delicious, horrendously oily and worth it. "Look, McCree, just like Texas," he says, and Jesse laughs sarcastically and lets him have that. They order deep-fried dough dusted with fine cinnamon sugar and filled with some kinda cheese; two, because they're bigger here at this place than they've seen by the entrance, roughly the size of Jesse's closed fist. Jesse forgets the name of it as quick as he learned it, and Genji mutters it to himself, mystified by the arrangement of sounds in one word.

"You eat this stuff?" Jesse licks his fingers clean of cinnamon sugar. _He_  eats this stuff. Oh, absolutely.

Genji doesn't answer until he locks eyes with Jesse. He takes a bite, menacing and serious. "I _eat_ ," he hisses, and chews with his mouth open. Jesse laughs again, and Genji has him buy another. He only finishes half before he starts to feel a little sick, but he admits nothing, because he won't give Jesse the pleasure of saying "I told you so."

Jesse says it anyway.

After that, Genji doesn't have the stomach for any more rides. They've gone on most of the rides that they're compatible with, size-wise, anyway. That only leaves games left. Jesse's only got the budget for a few after what they've eaten today.

"Genji," he calls, eyeing a shooting game just over yonder. The prizes aren't anything special, they're just framed prints and posters probably stolen off some art student's online portfolio. When Jesse calls again, Genji doesn't respond. He's concerned until he realizes that he's in awe of a massive, heinously ugly stuffed toy hanging from the metal awning of a dart game booth.

It looks like the thing plastered all over claw machines at the arcade he passed in Hanamura, a few years back. _God, it's fuckin' creepy,_  Gabriel had said. This hellish incarnation had a bloated face, with a head much larger than its limbs. He's pretty sure the original is just a head with tentacles or something, but the bootleg has arms and fingers, prehensile and opposable. The worst part is the whites of its eyes, thick white rings around glassy, beady black eyes. Its eyes and gaping mouth are _just_  misplaced, and it's _really_  fuckin' unnerving.

Jesse has his cash out almost at the same time Genji declares, "I want to play that." And it's nice, isn't it, to have wants other than revenge and to live long enough to exact revenge? She was wise, and she was correct. This was a kindness, a way for Genji not to unwind, but learn to let himself enjoy again.

The man in the booth takes two looks at Jesse's cash and one look at Genji - in alternating order. With a smile as crooked as it is smug, he points to the bootleg onion and tells them they've got enough cash for nine darts, and wouldn't you know it, it's nine balloons for the onion. Jesse rises to the challenge, ready to fulfill his babysitting mission, and the man puts out the nine darts, nice and neat.

Genji's hand is fast, like lightning, like the crack of a whip. He stops Jesse from throwing the darts himself, much to the glee of the man, and picks up the first dart. He tests its weight in his palm, his fingers, twirls it easily. An unusual amount of dexterity for a child. "Pick one," he tells Jesse over his shoulder, loud enough and clear enough for the man to hear.

"That green one," Jesse answers. "Next to where someone popped a blue one. Yellow over it, red next to it. There." He points, but Genji doesn't look; he doesn't blink, doesn't inhale or exhale; just throws the dart like it's nothing. It flies true and pops the green balloon.

Genji looks up at the man, with a smile as crooked as it is smug. The color drains from his face.

When he spins the ninth dart on his fingers, like a schoolkid with a pencil, Genji addresses the man directly. He tells him the same thing he told Jesse - _pick one_  - and after plenty of hemming and hawing, picks a balloon at the very edge of the pegboard. His efforts are in vain because Genji hits it, of course.

\- - - - - - - - - - 

They return to headquarters with Genji holding this eldritch abomination of an onion larger than him.

Jesse borrows it to harass Gabriel. He gets the bonus of startling Morrison too.

\- - - - - - - - - - 

The next time he sees Genji is in a common room near their living quarters. It's late. He's not startled, but if he comes back from putting out another of the Japanese cigarettes and stops abruptly at the sight of a small body on the sofa, he won't admit to it easily. Jesse's a little glad the bootleg onion is put away. Not in his room - maybe Angela's.

"You're finishing them off," he murmurs, his eyes illuminated by the distant glow of kitchen appliances in the corner.

"Don't like to let stuff go to waste." Jesse takes a seat next to him, takes note of his lack of stiffening when the sofa dips to accommodate his weight. The way Genji moves in response reminds him of space debris in old movies gravitating towards a black hole. He wishes that wasn't the only comparison that came to mind, 'cause the last thing he wants is to compare his ass to a black hole. "Innit past your bedtime?"

Genji scoffs. Jesse chuckles, low, quiet. They sit together.

"Hey," Jesse murmurs, looking over. Genji meets his eyes. Even in poor lighting, Jesse can see the rings of brown around his pupils - dark and brown, like earth softened by rain. Honest, calm. "About what happened in Ginza. We failed 'cause of me. I'm sorry I didn't turn away'n run when trouble came knockin'. You kept me from comin' into somethin' real messed up, probably." A beat. "Thanks for lookin' out for me."

He knows Genji well enough by now not to expect a response - the acknowledgment is silent. He doesn't know if that's him learning from his life before. If he listens now, before he speaks and acts. Genji as a child, and Genji in his youth, and Genji now. Jesse doesn't know. But he would like to know. If Genji lets him.

"McCree," Genji says, slow and sure. Like he's thinking in Japanese, and trying to figure out the correct words in English that would accurately convey what he wants them to convey. "I had fun today," he eventually settles on. "Your mission today was a success." He stays a few more moments afterwards, then leaves for his room. He doesn't look back. For awhile afterwards, Jesse is silent, basking in the warmth of genuine praise.

\- - - - - - - - - - 

In the morning, Jesse passes Genji on the way to the cafeteria for breakfast.

He comes around the corner, slows down and wonders if he should check on him, tease him about all the fried dough he ate. Genji makes the decision for him when his door slides open and stays open - because Jesse is in his way.

It's a relief for his neck because he doesn't have to keep looking down anymore. But he thinks he misses the expressiveness of Genji's face, now that his faceplate fits again. "Good to see you," Jesse finally says. When Genji doesn't answer, Jesse nods just the slightest bit, as politely as one can nod, and continues on to the cafeteria.

"Good to see you," Genji echoes behind Jesse's back. Jesse doesn't turn, but he smiles, raises his hand, and wiggles his fingers in acknowledgment.

Over breakfast, he thinks about the glimpse he got of the bootleg onion on Genji's bed in his otherwise bare room. He thinks about how Genji keeps it, and what it might mean to him.

 _I had fun today_ , Jesse thinks. _Good to see you._

**Author's Note:**

> the title "heart and soul" comes from the song, which i heard for the first time watching [this](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_\(film\)) movie as a kid. i kept thinking about the aging-deaging thing while writing lol. [tumblr](http://magnetholic.tumblr.com) if you wanna @ me :+)


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